


In Whiskey, Wisdom

by raiyana



Series: The Dwelf series [52]
Category: The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Blue Mountains | Ered Luin, Dwarf Culture & Customs, F/M, Fake/Pretend Relationship
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-25
Updated: 2019-04-01
Packaged: 2019-11-05 12:06:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,858
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17918510
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/raiyana/pseuds/raiyana
Summary: Longing for home, Bofur returns to Ered Luin - but can you ever really come back?





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the Plotbunny Challenge 2019

Coming back to Ered Luin felt odd, Bofur thought, wearing travelling clothes finer than what he’d once been able to afford for his brother’s wedding and seeing the once-familiar streets anew through eyes that had grown used to Erebor’s splendour.

It was strange, really, that a place once more familiar than the lines on his palms would feel so strange after such short absence.

He’d only been gone for five years, seen more than his fair share of adventure and danger, helped build a new home for their people – and yet he now felt like a stranger walking among those he had seen grow up, people he’d known from the days when he was a pebble himself.

“Good morning, my Lord,” the butcher said – the butcher who had once called him a good-for-nuthin _tunnelrat_ only a step above a petty dwarf – and Bofur had to stop himself looking over his shoulder for Balin.

“Morning,” he replied, slightly brusque, walking past the butcher as though he had an actual purpose for wandering through the village.

“They don’t know how to treat you anymore, Bofur,” someone else called softly, making him whirl around to see the wee girl – not so wee as all that but she _was_ shorter than most Hobbits he’d seen for all that he knew Eyja was a fully-grown dwarrowdam – who had taken over Dori’s tailoring shop when it became clear that Dori would remain in Erebor. “Yer a Lord now – it was different when you was just a miner.” Muttering the last words to herself, almost sadly, Eyja turned back to her small shop, the bell above the door chiming merrily above her head.

To Bofur it felt akin to a dirge, ringing out the truth he had not wanted to acknowledge to himself. Erebor had changed him – not him as a person, even if the job of overseeing the mines there had given him more responsibility and less time for joking and drinking – but it had changed the him who lived in the minds of others.

He was no longer Bofur, miner of the ‘Ur-clan of miners from Ered Luin, tolerable singing voice and excellent whittler of toys.

He was Bofur, Lord Companion of Erebor, now, with all the bells and whistles that came with it.

It was not worth it.

 

* * *

 

 

“How do I get them to see me as just Bofur, again, then?” he tried to ask Eyja, who looked surprisingly lovely in her nightgown and a thick robe against the spring chill, blinking blearily up at him.

“…Bofur?” she asked, blinking at him again. “I’m afraid none of those syllables amounted to words – why didn’t Geisli cut you off sooner?”

“’M Lord now,” Bofur slurred, grateful for the sudden support of Eyja and her doorjamb, sturdy things both. “No cuts off for Lords, think…” He hiccupped. “No want to be Lord… too fancy now.”

Staring down at her face, lit only by the small lamp she carried, he grinned. “Yo’v pretty eys, Eyja.”

Those pretty whiskey eyes widening in concern were the last thing Bofur saw before darkness rose up to claim him.

 

* * *

 

 

He awoke with a headache he sorely hoped he’d earned and no idea where in Mahal’s name he was, lying on what appeared to be a small couch in a well-decorated living room, tapestries filled with embroidery that would make Dori coo in desire on all the walls.

Bofur groaned.

“Oh!” A dam’s low voice carved lines of white-hot agony through his sore head, “you’re awake… _my Lord_.”

The title, even through his pounding head, seemed a fond tease now, and Bofur wondered what had happened to make her lose the respect his old acquaintances had treated him with ever since his arrival. The gentle mockery of her tone, despite the title, felt like coming home.

“Shhhh,” he begged, eyes shut tight against the light. “Mahal, _my head_.”

Something damp and blessedly cool pressed against his forehead, calloused fingers pushing through his hair to lift his head toward the rim of the cup held against his lips.

Bofur sipped.

Then he retched.

Eyes snapping open he glared at the dwarrowdam holding a pail for him and retched into it once more when the smell hit him. Feeling lightheaded and empty, Bofur fell back on the pillow, trying not to taste his own mouth.

“Drink this,” she murmured soothingly, “some water now.”

The liquid that filled his mouth, washing away the taste of bile and stale alcohol had to be a blessing from the Queen of Earth Bofur was certain. Only the Wife of Mahal could have made _water_ so tasty. He groaned, swallowing happily.

“You rest now,” the dam told him, “later we’ll try some dry biscuit, see if your stomach can handle food.”

Later sounded good to Bofur, trying to keep his gut from expelling that lovely water again.

“Sleep, if you can,” she continued, putting the cool cloth back on his forehead.

Bofur slept.

 

 

The next time he woke, it was to find Eyja singing softly to herself as she pushed her embroidery needle through fabric stretched taut on her hoop. Her hair was a darker gold than her cousin Geisli’s and seemed to gleam in the light of her candles.

“You’re pretty,” Bofur told her, voice rough with sleep. The dwarf smithing in his head had subsided some, the ache reduced to a slight pain and Bofur felt a few pangs of hunger, even if the idea of food still made him a bit queasy.

Eyja’s shoulders stiffened.

“You wake once more, Lord Bofur,” she greeted, turning her head to look at him, amber eyes narrowed in seeming displeasure.

“I’m… sorry for imposing on your hospitality,” Bofur offered, feeling more than foolish as the events of the night before came back to him. 

“Yes…” she wondered, looking down at the embroidery hoop in her lap. “Why did you come to my door?”

“I… I don’t rightly remember,” he offered vaguely, unaccustomed to the mortification he felt at the thought of his actions the night before. _Did I really ask you how to make them see me as me again?_

“Hmmm.” Eyja hummed, but Bofur didn’t think she believed him – in her shoes, he _definitely_ wouldn’t have – and returned her attention to her work, jabbing the needle through the thick fabric with a tightness around her mouth that looked like anger… or disappointment. “There’s a few biscuits on the table beside you,” she said, “and more water – try to hit the bucket again if you can’t keep it down you.”

Plain biscuits had never tasted so good either. Bofur ate quietly, trying to keep from dropping too many crumbs on the woven rug beneath the sofa. His stomach grumbled, but the biscuits remained inside him for the half-hour and some it took him to decide that he had disgraced himself enough for one day and probably should return to the cold and dark house he had once shared with his cousin. The house that no longer felt like _home_.

He didn’t particularly want to leave Eyja’s cosy house but imposing on her longer than he already had would do him no favours; already he could hear his Amad’s well-earned scolding, disregarding the fact that Amad had been dead for long years now and wouldn’t scold him until they met in the Halls of Waiting.

Getting upright made his head spin and had the unpleasant side effect of making him realise exactly how badly he reeked; stale alcohol with notes of vomit, greasy food and pipe-smoke gone cold.

Bofur sat back down, wondering if he could keep the biscuits down.

“You’re in no condition to walk nowhere, Mister Bofur,” Eyja scolded, “still half-drunk by my reckoning.”

“Yes,” Bofur nodded, regretting the motion of his head instantly. Slithering back down onto the sofa, he shivered, feeling cold. “If you’d permit me stay a mite longer,” he tried, giving up on courtly manners halfway with a groan of pain.

Eyja chuckled, but not meanly.

“What you need is a warm bath and some more sleep,” Eyja told him. “If’n you can make it to the tub, mind.”

Bofur would rather die than admit that her doubt was a valid concern.

“I’ve water heating but you’ve time yet for a kip before it’s ready for bathing,” she told him, making Bofur feel a sudden stab of longing for Erebor and her hot springs. Bathing in Ered Luin had always been a laborious affair and he felt guilty for putting Eyja to the trouble on top of caring for his self-afflicted illness.

“You are without a doubt, the best of dwarrowdams,” Bofur said, an old line he’d never meant quite so earnestly before.

Eyja scoffed lightly. “And yer a rake an’ a charmer, Mister Bofur – Lord or no.” Moving across to the next room – her kitchen probably – Bofur heard the light chuckle that followed her teasing but truthful words; he’d always been a flirt and people generally liked him.

He fell asleep with a small smile on his face.

 

“Water’s ready, Lord Sleepyhead,” Eyja’s teasing voice told him, bringing Bofur out of a dream he couldn’t snatch quickly enough to remember.

Blinking dazedly up at her, Bofur smiled groggily, reaching up to poke at one of the curls in her beard. “I like your hair,” he told her earnestly, confused when Eyja drew back, her expression shuttering like a house preparing to weather a winter storm.

“I trust you can bathe yourself?” she asked pointedly, ignoring his remark entirely as she retreated to her chair, the embroidery-hoop looking more like a shield now as she held it between him and herself.

Bofur nodded dumbly.

“Thank you,” he tried again, but Eyja did not look up to see him stagger off towards the kitchen, her attention firmly on her stiches.

Bofur sighed, trying to work out how he had offended his unwilling hostess but giving up the thought when he saw the large wooden tub that she had filled for him. The kettle hanging over the fire grate was large, but still she would have had to fill it to the brim at least five times to fill the tub with so much gently steaming water.

She had gone to a lot of trouble for him with this bath, and Bofur did not know how to show his appreciation; if he had still been Bofur the miner, he might have whittled her a replacement for the large wooden spoon hanging on her rack of cooking utensils, but he was not that dwarf anymore and Lord Bofur could not simply whittle someone a gift of appreciation without looking lie he was being a cheapskate.

Pulling his stained dirty clothes off with a sigh of relief, Bofur left them in a heap on the floor to be dealt with later, sinking into the water with a heartfelt groan.

“Ach, you forgot the soap,” Eyja groused, making Bofur startle awake from a pleasant daydream of what might have happened if he was _not_ a Lord of Erebor, but simply an unfortunately over-indulgent dwarf. Gasping in surprise, he sloshed water over the side of the tub, turning to stare at her.

Eyja raised an eyebrow and Bofur suddenly wondered what he looked like, his usually silky-straight hair a tangled mess and his finely curved and waxed moustache a sad drooping sight. His cheeks felt warm.

“Thank you for the bath,” he tried, looking at her feet rather than her face, suddenly shy.

“Here,” she replied, thrusting a small pot of sandsoap at him, infused with the smell of pine needles, before whirling around and removing herself from the kitchen with alacrity.

Bofur boggled, scooping up soap and setting to the task of scrubbing himself clean.

_Was Eyja… blushing?_

 

The thought of getting back into his frankly reeking clothes was not at all appealing but Bofur knew he had no choice – there was no way he could wash his clothes and remain unclad in Eyja’s house while they dried without causing scandal – even if the thought of walking across town to his own house wearing them seemed as insurmountable a task as reclaiming Erebor from a Dragon had once been.

“The clothes belonged to my brother,” Eyja called, her voice floating into the kitchen just as Bofur noticed the simple tunic and trousers left on the kitchen chair behind him. “They should fit.”

“You are more generous than I deserve, Mistress Eyja,” Bofur replied, pulling the tunic over his still wet hair and tugging the snug trousers up his hips. Young Arnoddr had died in the same mining collapse that killed Víli, Princess Dis’ husband, Bofur knew, too young to have grown into his full adult bulk.

Picking up his clothes, he dumped them in the tub, locating a washboard in one of Eyja’s cupboards and set to scrubbing the dirt and stains out of the fabric.

“Not so different as to not remember how to wash your own clothes then, I see,” Eyja teased, moving to the fire and swinging the smaller pot on its arm back over the flames.

“I don’t think I’m different at all, truly,” Bofur told her, “it’s only when people look at me like I’m a stranger… I remember that I’m not just Bofur from Slate street anymore.” He sighed. “I should have stayed in Erebor, I think. At least to _them_ I was never anything other than Lord Companion Bofur, mine overseer.”

“So why did you return here?” Eyja asked, her tone carefully neutral.

Bofur shrugged. The reasons that had seemed so over-powering in Erebor’s green stone could not be recalled to his mind in that moment. “I suppose… I missed the place. But I cannot truly return here – not as I was, not to the life I once _had_ …”

“Perhaps you are simply here to say farewell,” Eyja mumbled, staring into the pot she was stirring, the heavenly aroma of stew making Bofur’s guts rumble. “Before you leave for good.”

“No!” Bofur protested. “This is my _home_ , Eyja!” Then he sighed, shoulders slumping as he stared at the clothes in the tub, listlessly rubbing the fabric against the washboard. “Except it’s not, not really… not anymore.”

“Your home is Erebor,” Eyja said softly, turning to look at him and holding out the comb that had been in his belt pocket. Bofur vaguely remembered playing with it as he walked away from the Woolly Bear last night – this morning? – and accepted it silently. “With your family,” Eyja added, a small sad smile on her face, “and maybe a family of your own, some day.”

Bofur shook his head. “Nah – the dwarrowdams of Erebor have a marked tendency to see only my title – they don’t know me nor do most of them truly _want_ to,” he sighed. “And I’ve found none there worth making up songs about,” he grinned, turning to wink at Eyja who groaned.

“Yes, I remember some of your songs,” she muttered, stirring the pot. “They still sing that one about beating the Dragon out of Erebor, you know.”

“Really?”

“Yes. Now go hang up those wet things outside and we’ll see if you can stomach a bit of supper.”

Bofur couldn’t help it. He grinned like a loon as he skipped out of Eyja’s small house.

Ered Luin might not be his home anymore… but at least he had not been wholly forgotten.

 

* * *

 

“What were you doing round my cousin’s place last night, Bofur?” Geisli asked him when he showed up at the Woolly Bear to settle his tab and stick to only one ale with his supper. Her hands on her hips, she gave him a measuring look.

He had left Eyja’s house after dinner, feeling well enough on his feet, and returned in the morning to pick up his clean clothes and hand over the ones he had loaned from her, washed and folded as they had been when he took them. He had also left a couple of gold coins on the fabric – it didn’t feel right not to thank Eyja for her kindnesses – and left the bundle on the counter at her shop, waving awkwardly to her where she was engaged with a customer.

“I… maybe stumbled onto her doorstep after one too many of your ales, sweet Geisli,” Bofur offered, feeling a thrill of excitement that Geisli had forgotten his title. “And Eyja was kind enough to let me stay instead of booting me out on my arse like I rightly deserved. A Jewel among Dwarrowdams, your cousin.”

“Hrmpf,” Geisli muttered, setting down his supper with a bit more vigour than Bofur thought he had warranted. His ale sloshed over the rim of his stein.

He’d done nothing untoward to Eyja or her possessions – he’d even paid her for her trouble! – so Geisli had no reason to be wroth with him!

Bofur ate hurriedly, wondering at the dark glances that seemed to be coming his way from fellow patrons. He missed Nori suddenly; the star-haired ex-thief always knew how to read the undercurrents of a room and figure out what was going on.

The simmering anger followed him all the way home, stopping him from knocking on Eyja’s door although it wasn’t too late for visiting, and Bofur felt a bit cowardly when he closed his own old door behind him.

The house was so silent. Too silent for a dwarf used to the comings and goings of Bombur’s large family and the members of the Company wandering in on a whim for an ale and a laugh.

Unbidden, the memory of Eyja’s siting room, silent but for the sound of her needle piercing fabric, rose in his mind. Hers was a cosy silence, comforting, and Bofur suddenly felt trapped by the oppressive lack of noise in his own home.

He didn’t really examine the idea, locking the door behind him and marching off swiftly almost before he’d even decided to do so.

Eyja opened her door warily, her face blanking when she saw him.

“May I come in?” Bofur asked, wishing he’d worn a hat so he could take it off and occupy his hands somehow.

Eyja nodded, glancing down the street before taking a small step back.

“What do you want, my Lord?” she asked, crossing her arms over her chest.

Bofur shrugged helplessly. “To not be alone,” he admitted, surprised by the truth spilling from his lips.

“Come in then, my Lord,” she sighed, moving towards the kitchen. “I’ve put some tea on.”

“Will you call me Bofur?” he asked, wondering what had happened since the last time he’d seen her. Eyja’s shoulders stiffened.

“I think… that is not a good idea, my Lord,” she replied, her voice cool. “We have caused enough scandal.”

“ _Scandal??_ ” Bofur gaped at her, wiping his feet on the mat before following her into the warm kitchen. “But…. _How?_ ”

“ _You paid me five gold coins!_ ” Eyja hissed, whirling on him, one hand raised to point at him. Bofur’s heart sank. Eyja was angry, yes, but her eyes showed hurt, too, and he was certain he’s now arrived at the real reason for his cool reception at the Woolly Bear.

“But,” he tried, holding up his hands to ward off her anger, “you went to such trouble for me – and you barely even _know_ me!”

“ _How much could you buy with five gold pieces in Ered Luin?”_ Eyja seethed, her finger poking into his chest with each word. Bofur’s heart sank even lower. “ _How much_ , my _Lord_?” she continued, the title now a mockery.

“I- “

“I’ll tell you how much people _think_ you can buy!” she hissed furiously. “A night with some poor girl who lives alone for starters, and knowledge of whether you’ve fathered a bastard on her to boot!”

Bofur gaped. Eyja whirled back towards her tea pot, shoulders shaking.

“I’m sorry,” he mumbled contritely, reaching out to touch her shoulder though his hand fell back down before he could touch her. “I never meant…”

“It’s easy enough for _you_ ,” she scoffed. “You get to leave, go back to Erebor and they’ll forget you again. But I must live here, among people who will… who will at most think me lucky that I am not carrying a pebble from a dwarf who upped and left for stronger stone, but who will never believe me even if I protested their truth with my own.” Her breath hitched. “I am…” angrily, she poured the water, sloshing it over the rim of the pot with a scream of frustration.

Bofur rescued the pot of boiling water, his own hands trembling as he realised what she had not said: Even if Eyja were to wish to marry after this, odds were that no dwarf of proper upbringing would have her, seeing her as somehow damaged by their imagined union. His heart felt cold. Against gossip, there had never been any true shields…true.. truth…

The idea was almost crystalline in its simplicity, a thing of beauty that tripped over his tongue without much control from his brain. “Then I will court you – or pretend to, at any rate – and you can go to Erebor with me… no one need know of it there; you may simply be a friend of mine come to seek her fortune in our reclaimed homeland and seeing the chance for an experienced escort by joining my party.”

“ _WHAT?”_

 


	2. Chapter 2

Somehow, Bofur had convinced Eyja – employing all his vaunted charm – to go along with his honestly _insane_ plan to save her from a stupidity of his own making. A feat he thought ought to be immortalised in one of Ori’s sagas considering how long it had taken; he had not left her home until midnight had come and passed.

She had shouted at him for a while after his blurted idea, which was fair. Bofur found himself with the odd realisation that Eyja really was quite a bit prettier than Geisli – particularly when she was riled and passionate, those whiskey eyes lit with fire.

Whoever did wed Eyja would be a lucky Dwarf, Bofur thought, watching her hands fly like birds through the air as she gestured.

In the end, she had to agree that starting over elsewhere would be better than staying in Ered Luin; Bofur did not like it, but when he thought about it her analysis of her future in Ered Luin was dishearteningly accurate. He cursed himself for a fool more than once during those long hours – if only he’d hidden the money or brought the clothes back to her at a different time… or hadn’t shown up drunk off his head on her doorstep at all, really.

As he walked home beneath the stars, Bofur could nearly feel the blistering of a tongue-lashing Amad would have given him if she ever heard of him doing such a reckless thing – not that he hadn’t spent the night with a lass here or there for less innocent purposes than the time he’d spent in Eyja’s house, of course, but at least there had been no _witnesses_.

And no unintended consequences.

Good thing Bombur and Bifur had both elected to stay in Erebor, really.

Bombur seemed laidback and jolly to people who didn’t know better, but he had definitely inherited the sharper uses of a tongue from their late Amad, and Bofur winced at the thought of Bifur’s disappointed gaze which always seemed to cut sharper than any words might.

He did not sleep well.

He woke early, only one thought in his mind: _I told Gimli I’d be leaving with his caravan… in three days!_

 

 

“How are we going to pull this off?” Eyja fretted when Bofur returned to her small house in the morning, looking like she had hardly slept and barely giving him time to offer a greeting before she pulled him into the house. “You’re _not_ in love with me,” she continued, letting go of his wrist to tug on one of her braids, “no one would believe that for a moment, the way you flirt with anyone even remotely pretty.”

“Oi!” Bofur objected, feeling that assessment to be a little harsh; he had _some_ taste, at least, even if he couldn’t deny a fascination with golden hair. “I never flirted with you!”

Eyja’s lips thinned.

“ _I know._ ”

Somehow, Bofur did not think he could salvage his argument by claiming he’d wanted to… because that would be a lie. Before he’d left, he’d been vaguely aware of Eyja’s existence, in that way that he was aware of the other Dwarrow who had once been part of his school class where Frís taught pebbles to read but had barely interacted with since. He was, of course, far more familiar with Geisli, Eyja’s brash and beautiful cousin, but that was because Geisli was his favourite barmaid at the Woolly Bear.

As an orphan of the War against Orcs like Bifur – Bofur himself had been a wartime pebble – she had no family to speak for her except Geisli, who seemed unwilling to believe her. Bofur found that odd, considering how well the barmaid of his once-favourite tavern knew him, never mind how well she must know _Eyja_ who grew up with her.

He felt oddly angry at that thought, and had to remind himself that despite appearances, Eyja’s honour was not actually his to defend.

It didn’t stop him wanting to clout every dwarf who’d ever looked askance at her, however.

Bofur didn’t actually remember the last time he’d spoken with Eyja before coming back to Ered Luin – as Dori’s senior apprentice, probably, obtaining something for Athalrún, most likely – and even though it was his suggestion, he truthfully thought her doubts were more than warranted.

In Erebor, however, she would simply be one among many creating a better life for themselves under the green stone of the Lonely Mountain – and

Cursing himself for telling Gimli he would be returning with them when he bumped into the young merchant after leaving Eyja’s house that first morning, laving them only a few days to get everything sorted, Bofur held out his hand.

“Take my hand,” he said, “and we’ll start there. We’ve only got three days before we leave.”

 _Mahal, please let us be able to pull this off_.

Taking the proffered limb, Eyja held his hand gingerly. Bofur sighed.

“That won’t do,” he muttered, picturing the way Bombur and Athalrún had looked when they first started going out, “like this.” Tugging her by the hand until she was standing beside him, Bofur grinned and placed Eyja’s fingers in the crook of his elbow.

“Now what?” she asked frostily.

“Now you try to relax, and pretend that you actually like me,” he quipped, waggling his eyebrows.

Eyja snorted a half-laugh, squeezing his arm gently. “Well, who said I didn’t like you… _love_.”

Bofur’s prepared line seemed to die halfway up his throat, bobbing like an apple when he swallowed.

Eyja didn’t seem to notice, pulling the door open, and together they set off for the marketplace to haggle for the necessary supplies for a journey all the way to Erebor.

She had sagely informed him that her clothing and weather-gear might as well come out of her own stock, even if she’d have to stitch it quickly or on the road to be able to depart on the date he’d set, so what they really needed was walking boots, a cart, and some of the odds and ends that Bofur never remembered to pack for himself. Gimli, at least, would appreciate not having to share his things on the road, which might mollify him a bit about the sudden addition of a new travelling companion, Bofur thought.

 

Bofur would be lying if he claimed that there wasn’t a part of him that crowed at the thought of his very own pretty golden-haired lass on his arm, even if he kept reminding himself that Eyja’s sturdy presence beside him was based in deception and not actual love. Regardless, he enjoyed staring down everyone looking even remotely like they wanted to comment when they spotted him walking down the street with Eyja on his arm. He felt a sizeable measure of glee when introducing himself as her betrothed to the merchants they met, taking pleasure in the widening eyes of those most prone to gossip and the hurried stream of whispers following them. Eyja tutted at him after they left the first stall, but she seemed more relaxed now, and Bofur guiltily wondered how differently she had been treated the day before by these same small-minded Dwarrow. It made him angry, really, to think that people who had known the both of them since pebbles could turn so quickly. For himself, he might have cared less – he’d always had a deserved reputation for being a flirt, after all – but Eyja had only ever been an upstanding member of society; Bofur could not recall her ever being embroiled in anything remotely scandalous.  

 

“I’ll need to bring my stock along,” Eyja frowned, opening the door to her small shop, the bells tingling overhead reminding him of Dori. “But some will have to be left behind – it won’t all fit on that one cart.”

“You do realise that we’ll be travelling with one of Glóin’s merchant caravans, right?” Bofur wondered, walking off to study one of he tapestries that hung in the shop, showing the family tree for Durin’s Line going back four generations – including off-shoots. “I’m sure Gimli will be able to fit spare stock _somewhere_ as a small favour to my intended.” The word twisted in his gut, somewhere between pleasure and fear. _Intended._ It sounded so… official. Behind him, Eyja gasped.

“You mean… we won’t be _alone_?” she hissed, but when he turned around, she looked fearful rather than angry.

“That would hardly be smart,” Bofur countered, quite logically in his own ears. “Besides it’s a long journey – safety in numbers.”

Eyja paled, sitting down on the small stool behind her.

Bofur moved closer, taking her hand in his own and squeezed it gently. “You don’t have to be scared,” he promised quietly, “there are more than enough warriors along to keep you safe; I’m not too bad with my mattock, either,” he smirked, giving her a wink and the waggle of eyebrows that usually made dwarrowdams chuckle. Eyja simply stared at him blankly.

“Do you want a new hat?” she asked.

Bofur boggled at the non-sequitur. “Wha- _why?_ ” he asked, patting the hat that had replaced the one he’d worn through-out the quest. It wasn’t _quite_ as large, but it was just as warm on a cold night. He felt quite protective of it, suddenly.

“Well, if we’re supposed to keep _this_ …” she gestured to the space between them, the old counter littered with pincushions and spare buttons in trays, “… _thing_ … up _for months_ , Bofur… I need to make you a First Gift – and you have to give me one, I guess.”

Bofur had a moment of panic then, wondering what in the name of Mahal’s Wife he might gift her that would be pretty enough to count as a first Gift but also useful enough that no one would consider it an odd thing to have afterwards.

“I don’t know what to give you,” he admitted, “but I guess my hat has seen better days?” Taking it off, he placed it on the counter, feeling oddly naked without its comforting weight.

“You carve things, don’t you?” Eyja mumbled, giving him a quick glance before she was distracted by the measuring string she held against his hat, counting the evenly spaced knots and writing the numbers down on a small wax tablet. “I’m sure you could carve me a pretty box or some-such for my trinkets?”

Bofur breathed a sigh of relief. “I can do that,” he nodded, “though I’ll need some wood – I’ll be right back.” He’d never been a true believer in the Dance of Courtship as played among the nobles of their people, but it seemed a better way to go about a pretend courtship than anything else he could come up with. Somehow it felt more respectable – and the Dance had stopgaps, which would make their inevitable break more easily explainable.

He hoped.

 _Mahal, please let me pull this off_.

Eyja just nodded, her stylus making quick sure scratches in the beeswax – he recognised a few of the patterns as traditional decorative borders – and Bofur left her to her planning.

 

Almost as he stepped out of the shop, Bofur bumped into Geisli, whose blue eyes narrowed when she recognised him and realised which shop he’d just come from. Belatedly, Bofur realised that the familiar weight of his hat was not on his head.

“So, you weren’t satisfied with _one_ night, you troll’s carbuncle?” Geisli hissed, poking a finger into his chest. “Had to come back and get your money’s worth, is that it?!”

For a moment, Bofur felt frozen – _how did Geisli know he’d spent most of the evening into the small hours in Eyja’s home last night?_ – but then he rallied himself.

Geisli was simply the first test of many.

“I swear to you,” Bofur tried, well-aware of the people who had stopped to watch – Geisli had never been accused of being _meek_ , after all, and her voice could carry from one end of a crowded taproom to the other with ease. A not-quite empty street was no trouble. “My intentions with Eyja are and have always been entirely honourable.”

Geisli scoffed. Bofur recognised that angry look on her face – uglier in the sober light of day than it had ever been in the dim lights of the Woolly Bear – as one he had seen when she was just about to berate some drunken lout for pinching her arse or a similar offense.

Trying to give her his most earnest smile, Bofur was quite certain he did not manage to be convincing in Geisli’s eyes at all, wondering at her sudden protectiveness; if not for the fact that he’d known them both since he was young, he wouldn’t even have known Eyja was a relation.

The sound of the door opening behind him did not make Bofur’s heart beat any slower.

Later, however, he thought he had heard no more welcome sound than the soft low voice of Eyja in that moment.

“Bofur, you forgot your hat, silly thing – Oh, cousin.” Coming to a stop beside him, Bofur felt Eyja’s fingers brush his own, catching them in a mix of instinct and fear, childishly hoping she could shield him from Geisli’s wrath. The warmth of his hat reappeared on his head. “I thought I heard your voice… I’ll thank ye kindly to stop berating my intended, Geisli,” Eyja continued breezily, and Bofur could detect no trace of falsehood in the tone of her voice. He felt a glimmer of satisfaction at the way Geisli’s eyes widened, growing into a small smile when Eyja squeezed his hand.

“Thank you, sweetling,” he murmured, and it felt almost too easy to turn his head and kiss her cheek. “I’d best be off though – much to do, and less time for it. Mistress Geisli, a pleasure.” Tipping his hat slightly in Geisli’s direction, Bofur left with another squeeze of Eyja’s hand, carefully _not_ running.

He would carve Eyja the prettiest of boxes, he vowed.

 

Geisli stared at her, gaping like a cod on the fish merchant’s stall, and Eyja felt something like vengeful satisfaction fill her at that look on her cousin’s face. Geisli had always had a bullying streak and it felt _good_ to stand up to her like this, Eyja thought, feeling secure in the knowledge that this time Geisli would have no avenue of revenge for her uncommon burst of courage.

It was sweet.

“Intended?!” Geisli shrieked, turning to stare after Bofur for a moment before whirling back on Eyja. “ _Bofur?!_ ” She laughed, loud and derisive, and Eyja’s smile crumbled. “What in the name of Mahal would he want with _you_ , you silly wee mouse?” Cackling at her own wit Geisli took a step away from her shop.

“Marriage,” Eyja said, trying her best to sound believable. “I am leaving for Erebor with him and the caravan in a few days.”

Eyja had thought Geisli couldn’t look more irate or incredulous.

She was wrong.

Eyja wondered if Geisli had always been that ugly; Geisli had always been the pretty one but now her face seemed almost twisted with something Eyja did not recognise.

“ _You utter fool._ ” Geisli’s voice was colder than the mountain peak on midwinter’s eve. Eyja shivered.

“I know what I am doing, cousin,” she told her, confidence only half-faked. Creating a new life in Erebor did not seem overly troublesome compared to staying here – precisely because of people like Geisli – even if leaving wasn’t something she would have considered without Bofur’s suggestion. She thought she might even have a chance to be happy there; a good seamstress could always find work somewhere and she _did_ know people in Erebor, after all. Master Dori would be there, too, even if Bofur had told her that Dori did not run a tailoring shop anymore, and with him young Mister Ori. Bofur, also, might be considered a friendly face, Eyja thought, and that was surely enough to be getting on with.

“You know _nothing_ , a'lâju barafê[1]!” Geisli hissed, turning on her heel and stalking off before Eyja could respond to the insult.

Eyja sighed to herself and walked back into her shop. Even her own cousin thought her some sort of harlot now, and the thought _stung_ , even if she and Geisli had never been on particularly fond terms. She would be no more lonely in Erebor than she had been in Ered Luin, which was an encouraging thought on its own, somehow, no matter how depressing.

 

He had overpaid Auðvin, Bofur knew, walking away from the wood merchant’s stall carrying a small bundle of slats he’d carve into decorative flourishes to edge the lid of Eyja’s Gift, but he had also managed to wax lyrically about the special dwarrowdam who had so captured his heart.

And the baker’s wife – notorious for being the biggest gossip in the whole village if not in the Range itself – had been standing at the next stall over.

Of course, he hadn’t actually lied to Auðvin, Bofur told himself walking away. Eyja’s golden hair and those deep whiskey eyes made her exceptionally pretty when you bothered to look. Her nose was on the slimmer side, but the bump in the middle seemed to beg for kisses, and Bofur would be lying if he claimed that her compact build wasn’t worth a second glance.

Praising her skill with a needle, and kind-hearted smiles to the cobbler when he ordered some new travelling boots on rush order, and her beautiful singing voice to the wheel turner rounded out his first attempt to sway the tide of public opinion and Bofur smiled to himself as he left the market, carrying a bag of assorted travel necessities.

 

He stayed up late carving, nipping out for a gravy pie at Kjalarr’s for dinner which he spent mostly pretending to be mooning over Eyja – surprisingly convincingly, it would seem, given the number of former mining crewmates that came over to thump his back and offer congratulations; a few even went so far as to ask about the First Gift.

“I’m… I think I rather accidentally asked her _before_ I’d even decided to do it?” He muttered, feeling warm. “I am _making_ it, though!” he added quickly, nervously tugging on the left side of his moustache.

“That’s so like you, Bofur,” Master Kjalarr chuckled. Bombur’s old boss had come out from the kitchen to listen, bringing with him another stein of ale for Bofur. “I heard the wedding will be in Erebor?”

Bofur felt a real blush flood his cheeks at that question but waved off the hoots of laughter. The mood of the room this night was friendly and joyous – as it should be on the occasion of an announced courtship, admittedly – and Bofur’s confidence in the plan grew. “Yes,” he nodded. “I wouldn’t wish to deprive my family of the chance to laugh and dance at my wedding – Eyja doesn’t have many relations, of course, but Master Dori would be happy to stand for her, I’m sure.” For a moment, he could almost see it – Thorin would be officiating, Dori looking maternally proud of her former apprentice, Ori with his big eyes scribbling everything down for posterity and trying not to let Kíli’s winks get to him – and hear the cheer of his family when the final stroke of the hammer fell and they were forged together in truth.

He swallowed, nearly choking on a drop of ale.

Kjalarr’s meaty fist pounded his back, uproarious laughter echoing around him.

“Good on you both, aye – my best wishes go with ye, lad. May the Lifegiver bless your union.” Drawing away, Kjalarr winked at him. “Give my best to your brother and the missus and the littl’uns, aye?”

Bofur’s cheeks felt like they were on fire.

 

* * *

[1] You shame of my family


End file.
